Loving Hut – Special with Brian Feldman

This past Saturday, local performance artist Brian Feldman (visit http://www.brianfeldman.com ), in honor of Loving Hut’s win as best vendor at this year’s Orlando Fringe Festival, has decided to award them by doing a performance piece at their humble hut and also to celebrate his 10th anniversary since turning away from eating meat products. The performance act: to eat all the items off of the Loving Hut Menu!

This formidable feat is no joke as there were over 64 items of food on their menu each made, as David the kindly, jovial owner of Loving Hut reminded us, by vegans with care and made with love.

Loving Hut is a relatively new establishment here in Central Florida, having only opened earlier this year in the space formerly occupied by Vietnamese restaurants Thanh Thanh and Tay do a little bit west of Bumby Ave on Colonial Dr. Loving Hut’s concept is simple: Be Veg. Go Green. Save the Planet. The owners and workers and chefs at Loving Hut have one not so simple mission: to save the world by starting here in Orlando.

I thought that was a pretty cool idea, and harmless enough as it seems. I did think it was a bit odd how the television playing in the background was “Supreme Master TV” with pervasive notes from the blond-haired Supreme Master Ching Hai, on the good in the world and the goodness of vegetarianism. Even the fortune cookies here had special notes about living from our Supreme Master Ching Hai. A bit too much like Big Brother a la 1984 for me.

Inside the hut, all the chairs and tables are pure white, everything white and pure like a doctor’s office or something. On the walls are photos of Leonardo Davinchi, Albert Einstein, and other figures with the saying “These smart, beautiful people are vegetarian, why aren’t you?” Good point. I think I love meat just too much to let it go for enlightenment just yet.

Looking over their menu, I saw that most of the items were pretty standard Vietnamese/Chinese fare with vegan twists, but some of them had strange names like happy dog and noble rice?

I ordered the small golden tofu and a glass of lemon juice drink (da chanh – a Vietnamese form of lemonade). A small soup made with carrots and chayot ( I think its a type of melon), complimentary of the house arrived first. The golden tofu was fried with a tasty breading, similar to that found for fish sticks, oh so crunchy and good. The lemonade was refreshing and sweetly sour. Its also noted that the dishes are all arranged beautifully, which David chimes in is not unintentional in order to encourage more people to try it, because they might just like it afterwards.

The food is pretty cheap and also pretty good here, minus the sometimes overly strong messages to convert to the Loving Hut religion and/or cult. Some people call it a cult but I don’t see much diference between this and any other religion, they’re just people trying to do good in the world.

As Brian Feldman begins his conquest of the Loving Hut Menu, I watch on and wish him good luck. The items on there do look delicious, especially when you know you are saving the world one step at a time.

Supreme Master Ching Hai watches over us like a mother, a all seeing all powerful supreme mother